{"id":4937,"date":"2026-04-03T18:20:45","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T18:20:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/?p=4937"},"modified":"2026-04-03T18:21:32","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T18:21:32","slug":"our-minority-coddling-courts-reduce-24-year-jail-sentence-for-fraudster-from-sierra-leone-who-conned-seniors-out-of-140000-to-less-than-two-years-house-arrest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/?p=4937","title":{"rendered":"Our Minority Coddling Courts Reduce 24-year Jail Sentence for Fraudster from Sierra Leone Who Conned Seniors Out of $140,000 to Less Than Two Years House Arrest"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Our Minority Coddling Courts Reduce 24-year Jail Sentence for Fraudster from Sierra Leone Who Conned Seniors Out of $140,000 to Less Than Two Years House Arrest\u00a0<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Fraud\u00adster stole nearly $140K from seni\u00adorsCalgary Herald<\/a>TARA BRADBURY1 Apr 2026\u2022 <\/h1>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A man who defrauded seni\u00adors in New\u00adfound\u00adland and Nova Sco\u00adtia out of nearly $140,000 in a \u201cgrand\u00adpar\u00adent scam\u201d will serve just under two years of house arrest after the court reduced what ini\u00adtially totalled a 24-year sen\u00adtence.Charles Gil\u00adlen, 25, also has four years to pay back the stolen money that was never recovered.\u201cFraud schemes per\u00adpet\u00adrated against the eld\u00aderly are despic\u00adable crim\u00adinal actions that amount to an abuse of seni\u00adors,\u201d Chief Justice Ray\u00admond Whalen said, not\u00ading eld\u00aderly people are more fre\u00adquently the tar\u00adget of such scams. Gil\u00adlen was sen\u00adtenced in the Supreme Court of New\u00adfound\u00adland and Lab\u00adrador in St. John’s on Monday, on 16 fraud charges tied to scams car\u00adried out in early 2023 against vic\u00adtims aged 70 to 88.Royal New\u00adfound\u00adland Con\u00adstabu\u00adlary officers arres\u00adted Gil\u00adlen on a plane at St. John`s air\u00adport that was ready to take off for Montreal. He was car\u00adry\u00ading more than $31,000 in cash in his wal\u00adlet, an envel\u00adope and a sock. Invest\u00adig\u00adat\u00adors later recovered another $36,440 from boxes he had already shipped to Que\u00adbec.His eld\u00aderly vic\u00adtims received a phone call from someone pos\u00ading as a grand\u00adchild or another young rel\u00adat\u00adive in urgent legal trouble, who told them they needed thou\u00adsands of dol\u00adlars in cash for bail.A \u201claw\u00adyer\u201d then came on the line and instruc\u00adted the senior to with\u00addraw cash and hand it over to a \u201cbonds\u00adman\u201d who would visit their home. He warned the seni\u00adors not to tell any\u00adone because of a court-ordered \u201cgag order.\u201dAll those who met with the \u201cbonds\u00adman\u201d gave a descrip\u00adtion that matched Gil\u00adlen. The court has accep\u00adted that Gil\u00adlen’s role in the scam was lim\u00adited to that, and oth\u00aders involved in the fraud have not been iden\u00adti\u00adfied.Three of the seni\u00adors wrote vic\u00adtim impact state\u00adments describ\u00ading feel\u00ading vul\u00adner\u00adable, embar\u00adrassed, and fear\u00adful to answer the phone or door. They said they were wor\u00adried about their grand\u00adchil\u00addren’s safety and their own fin\u00adan\u00adcial secur\u00adity, and struggled with los\u00ading their sav\u00adings.Gil\u00adlen also addressed the court, apo\u00adlo\u00adgiz\u00ading to the vic\u00adtims and the com\u00admunity and say\u00ading he had com\u00admit\u00adted the crimes as a broke uni\u00adversity stu\u00addent who had made a bad decision. He said his own grand\u00adpar\u00adents had raised him to do bet\u00adter.Pro\u00adsec\u00adutor Mark James sought a prison term of 42 to 45 months and defence law\u00adyer Andrea Viz\u00adsolyi argued for a 16- to 34-month period of house arrest.On Monday, the judge said he would impose a sen\u00adtence of 18 con\u00adsec\u00adut\u00adive months for each of Gil\u00adlen’s indi\u00advidual charges, for a total of 24 years.Under the prin\u00adciple of total\u00adity in Cana\u00addian law \u2014 which ensures an offender sen\u00adtenced for mul\u00adtiple crimes at once does not receive an unduly harsh over\u00adall sen\u00adtence when the indi\u00advidual terms are added together \u2014 Whalen reduced that over\u00adall sen\u00adtence to four years.The judge then deduc\u00adted time as fol\u00adlows:\u275a Pre-trial cus\u00adtody: Gil\u00adlen received credit for 295 days spent on remand, cal\u00adcu\u00adlated at the stand\u00adard rate of 1.5 days for each day served\u275a Harsh jail con\u00addi\u00adtions: His sen\u00adtence was reduced by an addi\u00adtional 200 days due to excep\u00adtion\u00adally bad con\u00addi\u00adtions at Her Majesty’s Pen\u00adit\u00aden\u00adtiary, includ\u00ading inad\u00adequate facil\u00adit\u00adies, over\u00adcrowding and exper\u00adi\u00adences of racism\u275a Harsh bail con\u00addi\u00adtions: A fur\u00adther 100 days were deduc\u00adted to account for restrict\u00adive bail con\u00addi\u00adtions the judge found to be pun\u00adit\u00adive, includ\u00ading the wear\u00ading and expense of an ankle mon\u00aditor for two years Gil\u00adlen has 718 days left to serve. Whalen accep\u00adted inform\u00ada\u00adtion presen\u00adted by an Impact of Race and Cul\u00adture Assess\u00adment, a pre-sen\u00adten\u00adcing report pre\u00adpared for Black and other racial\u00adized offend\u00aders that provides the courts with inform\u00ada\u00adtion about the per\u00adson’s back\u00adground.He did not accept, however, that there was a link between Gil\u00adlen’s crimes and his life exper\u00adi\u00adences, which include com\u00ading to Win\u00adnipeg with his grand\u00adpar\u00adents as refugees from Sierra Leone after los\u00ading both his par\u00adents in war, and exper\u00adi\u00aden\u00adcing racism and dis\u00adcrim\u00adin\u00ada\u00adtion while grow\u00ading up and as a uni\u00adversity stu\u00addent.\u201cHe was motiv\u00adated by sheer greed and drawn by a prom\u00adise of easy money,\u201d the judge said.Gil\u00adlen’s moral culp\u00adab\u00adil\u00adity is very high, Whalen said, and the sen\u00adtence must prop\u00aderly denounce the crime. Whalen gran\u00adted the defence’s request for Gil\u00adlen to serve the remain\u00ading time on house arrest in Man\u00aditoba, so he can work to pay back $70,455 of the vic\u00adtims’ money that was not recovered.One of the con\u00addi\u00adtions is that he live with his grand\u00adpar\u00adents.<\/h1>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our Minority Coddling Courts Reduce 24-year Jail Sentence for Fraudster from Sierra Leone Who Conned Seniors Out of $140,000 to Less Than Two Years House Arrest\u00a0 Fraud\u00adster stole nearly $140K from seni\u00adorsCalgary HeraldTARA BRADBURY1 Apr 2026\u2022 A man who defrauded seni\u00adors in New\u00adfound\u00adland and Nova Sco\u00adtia out of nearly $140,000 in a \u201cgrand\u00adpar\u00adent scam\u201d will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3491,3488,3490,3489],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4937"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4941,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937\/revisions\/4941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadafirst.nfshost.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}